New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 21st July 2023
Following several fascinating albums exploring the music of lesser-spotted Baroque composers (including several figures from his native Croatia), Čičić tackles one of the cornerstones of the solo violin repertoire. The recording was made in the spring of 2021 at Crichton Collegiate Church: Čičić was inspired by guitarist Sean Shibe's Bach album Pour La Luth Ò Cembal, which was captured at the same atmospheric venue two years earlier.
Presto will be hosting a launch-event for this album at 6.30 this evening - locals can book a free ticket here, and footage will be shared on our YouTube channel in the coming weeks.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Savall founded Orpheus XII to 'enhance the integration of professional refugee or immigrant musicians through the transmission and sharing of their culture' after visiting Calais in April 2016. The ensemble's debut recording sees them joining forces with Hespèrion XXI for a programme of music from Syria, Bangladesh, Kurdistan, Afghanistan, Greece, Lebanon, Iraq , Morocco, Tunisia and Turkey.
Available Formats: 2 SACDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This is the first instalment of a projected series of Mendelssohn's complete orchestral works from the French early music ensemble, performed on period instruments and with forces similar to those which would have been used in the composer's lifetime. The 'Italian' Symphony is given here in its second version (from 1834), whilst the 'Reformation' is performed in its original 1829 version.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This is the debut album from fourteen-year-old treble Malakai Bayoh, whose credits to date have included the role of Oberto in Handel's Alcina at Covent Garden, Handel and Mozart arias at Classic FM Live at the Royal Albert Hall, and a recording of 'O Holy Night' with Aled Jones. The programme includes the 'Pie Jesu' from Andrew Lloyd Webber's Requiem, Handel's 'Lascia ch'io pianga' and 'Ombra mai fu', Puccini's 'O mio babbino caro', and Lucio Dalla's 'Caruso' (which Malakai sang in the final of this year's Britain's Got Talent).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
For his third album on Orchid Classics, the Spanish violinist explores music from his homeland, including Turina's 'Sonata Española', Sarasate's 'Romanza Andaluza' and Zigeunerweisen, Granados's Violin Sonata, two of Toldrà's Sonnets for Violin and Piano, and his own arrangement of Pablo Casals's El Cant dels Ocells. Born in Majorca, Fullana has been compared to Szeryng and Perlman by BBC Music Magazine and was recently hailed as 'an amazing talent' by Gustavo Dudamel.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Benedetto Marcello: Sinfonias & Cantatas
Nuria Rial (soprano), La Floridiana, Nicoleta Paraschivescu
Over 300 cantatas have been attributed to the Venetian composer Benedetto Marcello, but this project focuses on the contents of the Schneider-Genewein Collection (held in Zurich) - a set of 24 cantatas whose authorship is undisputed. The album features four such works for soprano and basso continuo: A voi prati felici, Qual turbine improvviso, Non son morta nel partire and Ti sento, Amor, ti sento (three of which receive their world premiere recordings here). Also included are five Sinfonie a quattro for strings.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Grigory Frid: The Complete Works for Violin and Piano
Isabelle van Keulen (violin), Oliver Triendl (piano)
Born in Petrograd in 1915, Grigory Samuilovich Frid was a prolific composer whose output included two operas (on the lives of Anne Frank and Van Gogh), three symphonies, numerous film-scores and a large amount of chamber music. The works here were composed between the late 1940s and early 70s, and include three violin sonatas and The Calendar of Nature (originally conceived as an orchestral work). Triendl writes: 'His earlier work is to be situated in the tradition of Shostakovich; his later compositions are stylistically much closer to the work of Edison Denisov, Sofia Gubaidulina and Alfred Schnittke'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Zacharias recently won an Opus Klassik Award for his recording of middle-period Haydn sonatas, and now he turns his attention to three of the French Suites which Bach composed during his time in Kothen, recorded on the 'Manfred Bürki' Steinway from 1901; the instrument was also played by Elisaveta Blumina for her 2021 Bach recital on the same label, when Fanfare noted that it was 'well suited to Bach’s music for its nuanced capabilities, its subdued sound, and its plethora of colors'.
Available Format: SACD
The Spanish guitarist enthuses that this new album features 'some of the most beautiful and intimate melodies ever written', including Debussy's 'Clair de lune' and 'La fille aux cheveux de lin', Couperin's 'Les baricades mistérieuses', Satie's Gymnopédie No. 1 and Gnossienne No. 1, and Yradier's 'La Paloma'. There's contemporary fare on offer too, in the form of Max Richter's 'A Catalogue of Afternoons', Philip Glass's 'Orphée's Bedroom', and the late Ryuichi Sakamoto's main theme for the 1983 film Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
A prolific composer of opera during the mid-eighteenth century, Giuseppe Scarlatti is thought to have been nephew to either Domenico or Alessandro, and worked in several major Italian cities before relocating to Vienna (where his social circle included Gluck) in 1760. Centring on Celidoro (a deposed Mallorcan king who has lived his life in solitary imprisonment and suddenly finds himself having to navigate a new world after escaping from captivity), I portentosi effetti della Madre Natura was premiered in 1752, and was resurrected at the Potsdam-Sanssouci Music Festival; this is the work's world premiere recording.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This is the first commercial recording of Loewe's oratorio on the life of Bohemian theologian and Protestant reformer Jan Hus (c.1370-1415), whose burning at the stake in Konstanz sparked the Hussite Wars of the early fifteenth century. The work was premiered by the Berliner Singakademie in December 1841, and revived by Gropper and company last October.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Stravinsky: Oedipus Rex & Pizzetti: Three Orchestral Preludes for Oedipus Rex By Sophocles
AJ Glueckert (Oedipus), Ekaterina Semenchuck (Jocasta), Alex Esposito (Creon), Adolfo Corrado (Tiresias); Orchestra e Coro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Daniele Gatti
Recorded at the Sala Zubin Mehta last June, this concert couples two Sophocles-inspired works from the first half of the twentieth century: Stravinsky's 1927 opera-oratorio (which sets a Latin translation of a version of the text by Jean Cocteau), and the three orchestral preludes which the 24-year-old Pizzetti composed for a staging of the play at Milan’s Teatro Olimpia in 1903. The role of the seer Tiresias in the Stravinsky is taken here by Italian bass Adolfo Corrado, who was recently crowned Cardiff Singer of the World.
Available Format: DVD Video
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
